hese places to roll up in
his blankets and sleep.

"Gay-cats" also come to grief at the hands of the road-kid. In more
familiar parlance, gay-cats are short-horns, _chechaquos_, new chums,
or tenderfeet. A gay-cat is a newcomer on The Road who is man-grown,
or, at least, youth-grown. A boy on The Road, on the other hand, no
matter how green he is, is never a gay-cat; he is a road-kid or a
"punk," and if he travels with a "profesh," he is known possessively
as a "prushun." I was never a prushun, for I did not take kindly to
possession. I was first a road-kid and then a profesh. Because I
started in young, I practically skipped my gay-cat apprenticeship. For
a short period, during the time I was exchanging my 'Frisco Kid monica
for that of Sailor Jack, I labored under the suspicion of being a
gay-cat. But closer acquaintance on the part of those that suspected
me quickly disabused their minds, and in a short time I acquired the
unmistakable airs and ear-marks of the blowed-in-the-glass profesh.
And be it known, here and now, that the profesh are the aristocracy of
The Road. They are the lords and masters, the aggressive men, the
primordial noblemen, the _blond beasts_ so beloved of Nietzsche.

When I came back over the hill from Nevada, I found that some river
pirate had stolen Dinny McCrea's boat. (A funny thing at this day is
that I cannot remember what became of the skiff in which Nickey the
Greek and I sailed from Oakland to Port Costa. I know that the
constable didn't get it, and I know that it didn't go with us up the
Sacramento River, and that is all I do know.) With the loss of Dinny
McCrea's boat, I was pledged to The Road; and when I grew tired of
Sacramento, I said good-by to the push (which, in its friendly way,
tried to ditch me from a freight as I left town) and started on a
_passear_ down the valley of the San Joaquin. The Road had gripped me
and would not let me go; and later, when I had voyaged to sea and done
one thing and another, I returned to The Road to make longer flights,
to be a "comet" and a profesh, and to plump into the bath of sociology
that wet me to the skin.

TWO THOUSAND STIFFS

A "stiff" is a tramp. It was once my fortune to travel a few weeks
with a "push" that numbered two thousand. This was known as "Kelly's
Army." Across the wild and woolly West, clear from California, General
Kelly and his heroes had captured trains; but they fell down when they
crossed the Missouri and